Did you know that the spring and autumn equinoxes are the only two days of the year when the length of the day is equal to the length of the night? That is why they have been marked and celebrated for thousands of years. The balance of these days is the focus of this Autumn Equinox Guided Meditation, as well as the shift from longer days to longer nights that follow the fall equinox.
Very few things in our world are balanced, after all. Even when they are, they rarely stay that way. So while the night and day will be perfectly balanced for a moment on the equinox, it will only be that way for a moment.
Why, then, does it matter? Because we choose to let it. Because something does not need to be permanent for it to hold value.
This Autumn Equinox Meditation Script is meant to honor this and to create space for the knowledge that all things do eventually change and not always for the better. Sometimes things get worse, and yet, humans keep finding ways to survive and to turn things around for the better.
Balance, harmony, change. Night and day, seasons. Everything shifts, and us alongside it.
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Autumn Equinox Meditation
Please do be gentle with yourself as you explore this Autumn Equinox Meditation. Allow any emotions that come up to exist as they do; emotions never last forever and it is okay to let them exist in you as you practice this meditation.
If your mind wanders, it is because that is what minds do. Learning how to focus your mind is a skill–something to be learned, practiced, and cultivated–not something that people tend to just naturally be good at. If you are not good at it yet, then keep practicing. The skill will come as you do.
Treat yourself with kindness. If your mind wanders, simply notice it and bring it back. No need for criticism here.
Prepare for Your Fall Equinox Meditation
If at all possible, it helps to meditate in calm and quiet places. Of course, life is calm and quiet about as often as it is balanced and peaceful, which is to say, rarely. Do what you can to find an environment where you can have a few uninterrupted minutes so that your mind has less trouble focusing.
Some people meditate in their cars, some in their closets, some in their bathrooms. Find a place that works for you and a comfortable position. Generally, people find that they need to move and fidget less if they are sitting or lying down, but do what works for you and your body.
Because our minds are so very good at wandering, the goal is simply to limit distractions as much as is reasonable. Once you have done that, you are ready to begin.
Begin Your Autumnal Equinox Meditation
Take a quick and shallow breath in and breathe it out quickly. Do this two more times. Then, fill your lungs with air as you settle in for this meditative moment, letting the air go slowly and peacefully. Do this two more times.
As you breathe at a normal pace for a moment, notice the difference in the two styles of breathing. You might notice that the quick and shallow breaths made you feel more anxious or light-headed, while the deeper and slower breaths helped your heart rate slow and you feel more at ease.
What else do you notice about how your breath changes how you feel? Take a moment or two to ponder this. The changes created in yourself by your breathing were changes that you created.
We rarely have as much control over anything in our lives as we do over our breath. Sometimes even our control over our breath can be difficult, when the air is thin or if there is something wrong with our lungs. If you have difficulty with breathing, you might try tapping your shoulder instead, first quickly, and then gently rubbing your shoulder slowly in a soothing manner.
The way we interact with ourselves has an effect. Notice the effect you have created within yourself today, in these few minutes that you have spent meditating so far. You are alive, and the way you interact with yourself matters very much to this life that you are living.
Deepen
Settle into your breathing, into your body. As you do so, consider whether your perspective of your life is balanced. Most humans are very, incredibly good at recognizing what is not going well. If that was your first thought, then give yourself a pat for being very, incredibly human.
Then, consider what things might be going well that you have not made notice of in a little while. Perhaps you have a beloved pet who remains loyal, or a very good book waiting to be read. Perhaps you have two legs that can walk, lungs that can breathe, and a heart that can beat.
If your legs, lungs, and heart have challenges, then spare a moment of gratitude that they continue to work to serve you, even if they do not work quite like you wish they would. The goal of this moment is balance, to honor the good in your life as well as the bad.
Perhaps you have a hard time honoring the bad. Perhaps you are someone who has learned not to pay any attention to their hurts and sorrows, for fear that those hurts and sorrows may be invalidated or overlooked.
If you have been around long enough to learn how to read this meditation, then you have been around long enough to experience pain and sorrow. Your hurt is valid. Your joy is valid. Your life can have both and still be a perfectly valid, meaningful, worthwhile life.
Find the balance. Imagine holding your hurts in one hand and your joys in the other, and bring both hands to your heart. Hold them there and send love to both.
Internalize
As you hold your hurts and joys, recognize that the world will likely not hold the same space for them as you do in this moment. In fact, you yourself are unlikely to hold this same space for them forever.
This is okay. The world does not need to be perfect in order for you, your hurts, and your joys to all exist in it. You do not need to be perfect in order for you, your hurts, and your joys to all exist in you.
At times your joys will be greater, and at times your hurts. Just as the night overtakes the day after the Autumnal Equinox, so sometimes your hurts will overtake your joy.
Remember that this is not permanent. Remember that you are a mercurial being and that just as life shifts in one direction, it will surely eventually shift in another.
Also remember that even when the night is hours and hours longer than the day, it never overtakes the day completely. Allow yourself to have space for joy when your hurts grow, and space for hurt when your joys grow. Life includes both; night and day, hurt and joy. They will rarely be equal, and both will always exist.
End
Notice your breathing once more. The way it moves in and out of your lungs, the way that your lungs work to keep you alive. As balanced as it can be, breathing in oxygen and out carbon dioxide, a cycle that has existed from the moment you were born and will continue to until the moment you die.
Remember the way your quick breathing or tapping made you feel and the difference in your slower breathing and gentler touch. When your hurts outweigh your joys, remember that you can be a source of peace and comfort in your life. Remember that the option to treat yourself with kindness is always available.
Take one more deep and gentle breath, hold it for a moment, and then let it go just as gently. As your breathing returns to its normal pace once more, allow yourself to become aware of the world around you. Of the sounds you hear, the scents you smell, and, or, the colors you see.
As you prepare to re-enter this world that you live in, please take some kindness with you.
